FDA set to ban trans fats on health concerns

View full sizeFILE - In this Jan. 18, 2012, file photo, Alexes Garcia makes cinnamon rolls for student's lunch in the kitchen at Kepner Middle School in Denver. The rolls are made using apple sauce instead of trans fats. Heart-clogging trans fats have been slowly disappearing from grocery aisles and restaurant menus in the last decade as nutritionists have criticized them and local governments have banned them. The Food and Drug Administration is now finishing the job as they announce Nov. 7, 2013, that it will require the food industry to gradually phase out trans fats, saying they are a threat to the health of Americans.(AP Photo/Ed Andrieski, File)

The Food and Drug Administration will announce a timeline Thursday for banning trans fat from food sold in America.

According to an Associated Press story, the agency will require companies that produce and process foods to gradually eliminate trans fat from their products.

According to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, the move could prevent 20,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths each year. While Hamburg concedes that the amount of trans fats in America's food supply has decline, they are still a "public health concern."

According to the story, trans fats no longer fall in to the FDA's "generally recognized as safe" category. Trans fats are known to raise levels of so-called "bad" cholesterol, increasing the risk of heart disease.